JOIN USResults from 21 out of 26 cantons indicate that French-speaking Switzerland has rejected the far-right initiative on expelling foreign criminals, but the country's German-speaking majority have accepted it.
For an initiative to pass into law, a double majority of cantons and overall population is required.
A year after successfully backing a push for the country to ban the construction of minarets, the far-right Swiss People's Party (SVP) has mounted another aggressive campaign.
This time they want Switzerland to clamp down on foreigners guilty of certain crimes by stripping them of their right to remain in the country.
Its signature poster illustrates a white sheep kicking a black sheep out of the Swiss flag. Another poster depicts a gangster-like man with the slogan "Ivan S., rapist, and soon a Swiss?"
"It's very simple: we think that people we welcome in Switzerland should respect the rules of this country," Fabrice Moscheni, president of the SVP in canton Vaud, told AFP.
"If they don't respect these rules, they should be going away and expelled from our territory," he said.
"If you welcome somebody to your house, and he comes and destroys everything, I don't think you want him to come back."
Judges can already issue expulsion orders for foreign criminals, but the SVP's proposal goes further.
It would require automatic expulsions for those found guilty of "rape, serious sexual offence, acts of violence such as robbery," drug trafficking, as well as "abuse of social aid."
According to the Federal Office of Migration, some 350 to 400 people are expelled every year, but this figure would rise to 1,500 with the adoption of the initiative.
Critics object that the initiative smacks of discrimination, and that it runs in the same xenophobic vein as that of banning minarets.
Entrepreneur Guillaume Morand, who funded his own campaign against the initiative, said the proposal "creates a two-speed justice system."
Amnesty International and the Socialist Party have also noted that the initiative is against international conventions, as it could see refugees sent back to their home countries where they risk being tortured or even killed.